2016 Actions for America

We’re all aware of the major problems facing our nation.  More than any other group or nation abroad, there is a trend which many -- including this author -- feel is the single biggest threat facing our nation, for it gives rise to many other problems that both Left and Right agree need addressing.  At the root of our national woes, we have the rise of Economic Feudalism.  

This manifests both in the domestic economy -- where the average person now has to work harder for less compensation than they got even a decade ago and where those on top of the economic ladder gain greater and greater compensation for mere position – and internationally, where military policy has become the enforcement division in service of unaccountable business interests.  

We've seen this with “too big to fail” attitudes on the part of elected government towards large corporations and we've now had several elections since the Citizens United and McCutcheon cases, where elections are bought and sold like any stock on Wall Street and where legislation against average workers’ right to act on their own behalf is now creeping onto the books of nearly every state.  If buying policy and forcing the majority of the populace to work harder and longer just to put food on the table isn't enough insurance to keep the citizenry in line with this New Order, the exponential militarization of police forces around the country and the increasingly free reign the police have in using excessive lethal force is.  This is the very definition of Imperial Fascism, as described by Mussolini as "the merger of state and corporate power."

To the completion of this end, there are several rhetorical tactics being used to justify the increasingly militaristic and fascistic methods being implemented across our nation.

Firstly, we have the increased reliance on a pseudo-philosophy that creates some “buzz-word” talking points designed to legitimize this Feudalistic trend.  Typically, these talking points can be found in the Right-Wing schools of thought, which tend to reject any attempt to check-and-balance economic disparity in the name of “individual free enterprise” and usually revert to a “blame-the-victim” approach when confronted with the negative results.  This tactic has been most evident when it comes to police abuse in their disproportionate targeting of minority communities.

Another classic tactic, by which Corporate Feudal interests maintain control, is through a focus, particularly in the mainstream network media, on divisive social issues.  The push for Theocracy by the religious right in this country, for instance, which, in seeking to remove the Constitutionally-guaranteed Freedom of Religion for all, and ironically, in mirroring fundamentalist talking points around the world, is a major contributor both to the push to divide the citizenry against itself as well as a force behind the degradation of our national education system, through the re-writing of our national history and the replacement of science with religious instruction in biology classrooms.  

This divisive tactic also manifests as a highly-xenophobic set of ideas which on the one hand divides the populace at home based on religion or ethnicity (usually directed at immigrants specifically, but also at social minorities in general) and on the other promotes a highly-militaristic imperial mindset when it comes to matters abroad.  The lies that were used to drag the US into the War in Iraq (and are now being used to promote the idea of another war with Iran) are the primary example.

While these talking points have great appeal to those souls who desperately hope for a good life without interference from those in power, in reality, these talking points empower those already on top at the expense of the powerless.  This ultimately interferes more with the average person’s well-being than any other force (ask yourself this – who really has more direct impact on your daily life:  the employer who pays your checks or the local council of your town, whose names you may not even know?).  We've seen everyone from political candidates to police captains use these very talking points in defense of the abuse of power time and time again.  Corruption in our case is literally trickling down from the top of the food chain, from the highest halls of government all the way down to your local police precinct, and it’s being justified on airwaves across the country on a daily basis.

Due to their simplistic appeal, these talking points have worked brilliantly, particularly in Social Media, to keep the population at each other’s proverbial throats.  By keeping the citizenry divided, frightened and ignorant, the unelected powers-that-be have an easier time of maintaining control.

“What can I do about this?” you may ask.  These are huge problems, well beyond the average person’s ability to confront.

Aside from political disobedience or outright armed rebellion (the latter of which has never worked in the history of our nation -- just ask the Confederates), the only tool at the disposal of the citizenry to address the root problem of Economic Feudalism is the Federal government itself on the national level and State governments on the local, both of which are still on paper accountable to the average person, but will soon be entirely in the hands of unelected moneyed interests rather than the citizenry’s if we don’t act.  To act, we have to unify and organize.  It is imperative that the citizenry retake the reigns of our own governance, and this will require measures that at first glance may be unpopular, especially among Right-Wingers.

The first step I’d advocate towards fixing the problem of economic feudalism is to steal a page from Teddy Roosevelt's playbook and push for the return of previously-successful governmental oversight and regulation of large-scale corporate business.  While admittedly at times inconvenient, regulation and taxation of large-scale corporate business quite successfully checked-and-balanced the forces of unaccountable corporate power for decades in this country.  That is, until the “neoliberal” forces of economic feudalism, originally championed in my lifetime by Ronald Reagan and continued by his successors, successfully pushed through campaigns to remove those impediments.  Like criminals freed from the fear of police, these interests literally got away with murder and very nearly ran our economy into the ground.  In the name of private profits, the public sector -- which serves us all -- is suffering.  Public infrastructure is crumbling, the criminal justice system has become a cash cow incentivizing the criminalization of the non-violent and bribery has become the modus operandi of elected government.  And as the impediments to economic feudal control over government are removed, the boldness with which these forces push forward increases.    By itself, reinstating a few pieces of proven, successful regulation and removing bribery from government will de-clog the mechanisms of our Constitutional government currently held hostage by gridlock.

But what can the average citizen do to make a positive difference?  There are a number of policies that we can push for – and many groups pushing for them that we can support:

FIRST, WE FORCIBLY SEPARATE CORPORATOCRACY FROM DEMOCRATIC GOVERNMENT

OPENSECRETS        The first step in mounting an effective citizen’s defense is in knowing who the real enemy is.  Perhaps the most important source of information on this list, this site tracks the donors and lobbyists’ ties to every elected official on the Federal level.  If you really want to find the people buying our government for their own interests, this is the place to start!

OVERTURN CITIZENS UNITED  Run by Credo Action, this citizens group is actively working to cut the ties of corruption between government and moneyed interests and is currently gaining ground in the fight to legally end the rampant bribery that has crippled our national governance.

OCCUPY WALL STREET   This group gained national notoriety for its correct identification of and initially-strong action against the root of governmental corruption -- unaccountable corporate power.  Though its organizational model is not the strongest, it has become an umbrella resource for numerous action groups seeking to empower the individual against forces ordinarily too powerful for a single individual to combat directly.

SECOND, WE CHECK THE ABUSE OF POWER BY POLICE AND MILITARY

ACLU             For almost 100 years, the ACLU has worked to defend and preserve the individual rights and liberties guaranteed by the Constitution and laws of the United States.  They know the system inside and out and are an ideal resource for training, information and legal defense, with chapters in every state in the Union.

SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER   Another experienced group, the SPLC is a non-profit legal advocacy group specializing in civil rights and legislation for the public -- rather than private -- interest.  If you're being victimized by police, these are the people to call!

STOP MASS INCARCERATION    This group is on the forefront of the fight against the commercialization of our criminal justice system.  Very much against the drug war, private prison complexes and the systemic targeting of minorities, their national network is a prime example of how to organize for our own defense.

THIRD, VOTE OUT THE INCUMBENTS AND REPLACE THEM WITH THIRD PARTY CANDIDATES

I SIDE WITH            A simple and fun way to figure out which party best represents your interests is to follow this link to a political quiz on the various issues facing the country.  The quiz takes about 20 minutes and delivers a comprehensive and often surprising result. 

Above all, though, the single most important thing we, as citizens, can do is to remain engaged in the process, rather than throw up our hands and give in.  At the bottom of this engagement is making sure that we use our power of the VOTE.

BALLETOPEDIA     The next step in informed voting is in knowing your options when it comes to political representation.  This site lists all recognized political parties in the USA.  Many of them have been recognized by most states and a simple Google search can direct you to the platforms of whichever party you feel most connected to.  If you’re as fed-up as I am with the same old lesser-of-two-evils choice that comes around every year, this site is ideal for finding someone better.

REMEMBER:  VOTING IS YOUR RIGHT AND DUTY AS A CITIZEN!  If you do NOTHING else, make sure you move heaven and earth to get your vote in.   Make sure you’re registered in your local town and have proper ID BEFORE you go to vote!

ALL of these groups and sites list actions that are happening every day around the country towards the return to true liberty for the average person.  Sign up for any one of them.  Even a day’s work can make all the difference in the world.

Stay as informed as you can on every issue, making sure you’re informed of the actual facts, not a biased narrative.  Avoid the mainstream network/ corporate news at all costs. 

News outlets such as Reuters, Democracy Now!, the Associated Press, VICE and C-Span all have long-standing histories of sticking to the facts and reporting in a straightforward manner.  White-hat hacker groups like Anonymous and whistle-blower groups like WikiLeaks also have solid reputations for delving into sources of information usually censored by unaccountable interests.  When these journalism groups report an opinion, they make a point of reporting it as such, where corporate media sources often will deliberately confuse fact with interpretation in order to sell more advertising time.

It’s a traditional assumption among totalitarian governments that the people they rule are too dumb or too weak to be treated as anything other than cattle.  The best thing we can do as citizens – and in the truest American tradition – is to make sure we prove our home-grown totalitarians wrong.

Statement

I am an American first, of European descent, raised secular and educated as a Jew.  In my blood is every immigrant experience in this country since the first waves of settlers in the 1600's.  Blood remembers.

I believe that we are all created equal and endowed with the inalienable common rights of Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.  To this end, the first duty of government must be to protect the powerless from the powerful. People have the right to choose their government and the duty to choose wisely.

I believe in freedom of expression and freedom from harm.  I believe in freedom of religion in private and freedom from religion in public. I believe in the right to a speedy, public and unbiased trial by a jury of my peers with the presumption of innocence until proven guilty.

I believe that human beings can rise above bestial nature.  Not only should we embrace our better angels for its own sake, but we must for our own survival.  Only by working together can we hope to live and let live as individuals.

I pledge allegiance to the Citizens of the World and to the Republics which stand for them, one Planet, indivisible, with Liberty and Justice for ALL.

This above all:  the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one.  

I live my life by these principles.  I believe they have been used before to make this world a better place and that they must be used again.

Join me in this cause. 

Divided, But Not Conquered

http://www.nopartysystem.com/featured/

In his Farewell Address, George Washington, our first President and Father of our country gave explicit warning against the creation of political parties.  In his view, the negative effect of party politics on the justice of our laws would:

Serve to organize faction, to give it an artificial and extraordinary force; to put, in the place of the delegated will of the nation the will of a party, often a small but artful and enterprising minority of the community; and, according to the alternate triumphs of different parties, to make the public administration the mirror of the ill-concerted and incongruous projects of faction, rather than the organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common counsels and modified by mutual interests.

We all have a tendency to focus on the Office of the Presidency, because of its glamour and position as military authority, but both realistically and legally, the Presidency is an inherently limited office.  No President has been legally able stay in the Oval Office for longer than eight years since the 1940’s.  Not so with Congress, where House Representatives and Senators can return and return with no limits on the number of terms.  Executives come and go, but Congressional members often have more lasting impact due to their longer and more-readily repeated terms.  If we can be sure of anything in our current climate of party division, it’s that as a nation, we’ve long since forgotten Washington’s most prescient advice when it comes to Congress.  

The effects are out for all of us to see:  Congress has been notably inactive in its duty of governing the nation and is currently gridlocked at unprecedented levels.  The Constitutional heart of our Government, the Legislature, has been shut down over what amounts to political temper tantrums by the major parties and further shut-downs are now threatened as a regular negotiation tactic.  Elected Representatives spend more time focusing on re-election than they do on the business they were initially elected to pursue.   The election process itself has become more of a football game than a referendum on the state of the nation and has resulted in concerted efforts to rig election districts to suit party one-upmanship  rather than tailoring party actions to the empirical needs of local jurisdictions.

This football team mentality, fostered by our media-fueled political process, has the American citizenry at odds with itself at levels we haven’t seen since the 1850’s and the on-set of the Civil War.  One thing I've noticed in all this, though, is that the extreme Right and Left do in fact agree on certain problems in the country, if not on the solution.  One of those places of agreement is that our government has become so plagued by partisan jockeying that it’s stopped serving the interests of the average person.

Let’s ponder for a moment:  If a person is out to conquer a nation, the easiest way to do so is to divide it.  The question therefore becomes, who is directly benefiting from this division in our own nation?  Washington himself said :

However combinations or associations of the above description may now and then answer popular ends, they are likely, in the course of time and things, to become potent engines, by which cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men will be enabled to subvert the power of the people and to usurp for themselves the reins of government, destroying afterwards the very engines which have lifted them to unjust dominion.

So we have to look at those who meet those criteria.  Within Congress and in the local governments on the State level, we can certainly find many viable candidates who, like the Machiavellian protagonist of House of Cards, have played the partisan game so effectively as to have remained in powerful office – both elected and appointed -- for decades with little fear of dislocation. But even they are beholden to other un-elected interests.  

So, how do we find the men behind the proverbial curtain?  How do we recognize those cunning, ambitious, and unprincipled men who have usurped for themselves the reins of government?  Following the money is a very good place to start for nowhere in our society is there more absolute power than at the top of the economic food chain, where resources are divided on the scale of nations, and where those who control those resources are almost completely unaccountable to the citizenry.  Boards of Directors aren’t elected by the citizenry, but the policies they set in their companies often affect our daily lives more directly than any legislation.  No parliamentary line in your average 2000-page bill has a greater impact than the wages set by one’s employer or the environment of the workplace.  

Following the Citizens United and McCutcheon Cases, the door to the out-and-out bribing of public officials and the purchasing of legislation has been blown wide open.  While this has been sold to the public as a triumph of Libertarianism over Tyranny, the reality of the situation is that the very organ of consistent and wholesome plans digested by common counsels and modified by mutual interests has been directly infected with a cancer through which a small, unelected and powerful economic minority has usurped the power to directly control all of our lives.  In the situation we’re currently facing, where you have private corporate interests literally writing legislation passed by representatives paid up front for their service, you have to ask: who’s really regulating whom?

Consider this:  No public servant is going to listen to the needs of voters when their coffers are being filled to the tune of millions by nigh-aristocratic interests and when the system of re-election is rigged to make irrelevant the actual will of the voting public.  

As long as we allow ourselves to be goaded into attacking one another over petty and hyped-up differences that boil down to attempts to publicly legislate private taste, we will remain divided – and easily conquered by an enemy we have as yet chosen not to see.

Our Nation in a Nutshell

In a nutshell, the situation nationally as I see it is this: 

(1) At the heart of everything, our economic balance, envisioned like a pyramid, is essentially standing on a single top-heavy point where the majority of our resources go to the Top 1%, rather than shoring up public infrastructure and supporting the bottom 90% of the economic base. This situation is unsustainable and untenable. Traditionally, when societies are at this point, they tend to tip over into chaotic and violent revolution. The powers-that-be are terrified of this eventuality.

(2) Demographically, the country is changing, which means that the white power-majority will soon be a minority regime. This, like the tipping over of economic balance, frightens many whites of all classes, who expect to be treated in the same manner that whites have treated everybody else for the past 400 years. In order to stay "on top", the leaders of the old order are using increasingly sophisticated and brutal forms of control, from rigging the economic game against the average person to undermining public education to mass surveillance to the brutal enforcement tactics of ever-more-militarized police forces. The fear of this demographic change -- as exemplified in the Regressive mind by Obama himself -- is a major part of what's spurring the massive resurgence of public racism that we're currently seeing. 

(3) The above two truths have led to the steady handing over of direct control of governmental power and policy to private moneyed interests over the past 35 years, which has all-but eradicated accountability to the citizenry. This merging of private corporate power with public governmental power is exactly Mussolini's definition of Fascism. As a result, both the military and police forces have positioned themselves where they are no longer required to follow the laws that they're sworn to uphold and defend. As the average person grows more desperate under increasing control, the more draconian the attempts at control by the military and police will be. 

(3) The ultimate trump card to all this is that the planet itself -- likely spurred on by humanity's irresponsible use of planetary resources -- is starting its periodic climate shift. While humanity as a species has survived at least one, if not two such shifts in our 100,000 year history, such shifts bring with them catastrophes of Biblical proportions. No matter how large a portion of humanity survives the next inevitable round, society as we know it will fundamentally change, likely reverting back to a proto-feudal state, where some "developed" areas will resemble a combination of "Mad Max" and Medieval Europe and the rest of the world will revert first to violent chaos and then to primitive hunter-gatherer status.

We as individuals have some hard choices to make on how to handle all this. We can fight to reverse the Fascist trends to which things are heading (Some may say it's too late. The idealist in me says it's never too late to try); We can give up trying, submit to Fascism and let history take it's course; Or we can try and anticipate the coming changes and do what we can as individuals to adapt.

The choice is up to us.

I Can't Breathe

I’ve been pondering over the last week how best to express my feelings at the sheer audacity of two nearly identical incidents of white police officers murdering unarmed black men in Ferguson and Staten Island, and walking away scot-free, with little to no accountability for their actions.  

The failure of two Grand Juries to indict these cops, confirming years of To Kill a Mockingbird cases across the country for far too long,  combined with the over-militarization of police forces around the country tells me that the deepest cornerstone of American Law – specifically the Rights of Miranda and Habeas Corpus has effectively been taken away from the citizenry. 

That by itself is enough to send Patriotic terror through my very soul.  What’s worse, though, is that a very big obstacle to fixing this issue is that too many are still clinging to the opinion that the cops are justified in using lethal force against unarmed citizens.  These are content-weak and vitriolic attempts to make what clearly is an issue of police management and racial equality NOT about what these cases clearly are all about.  

I’ve heard a lot of variations on “He broke the law and deserved what he got”.  This is what’s known as blaming the victim. Nobody – regardless of race, creed or color -- deserves a summary execution without trial for shoplifting, nor does anybody deserve a summary brutal execution for standing up for themselves when a cop harasses them without reading them their rights.  There's submitting to rule of law and then there's submitting to the abuse of law.  The two are very different things. What this argument essentially is calling for is the blind and knee-jerk submission to the law, even if it's very clearly being abused -- arguments in line with Loyalist thinking back in the 1770’s.  As history has shown, those arguments didn't hold true then and it doesn't hold true now.

“He was resisting arrest” is another common refrain I’m hearing from police supporters, which I’d say is one of the main variations of the victim blaming argument above.  In Eric Garner's case, we have the video.  He's very clearly doing what any of us would do if we were running out of a store we'd stopped off at to stop a parking ticket from being put on the windshield of our standing car.  Yes, bootleg cigarettes are illegal, but on the same level as parking in a “no parking” zone or jaywalking -- certainly not deserving of tactics designed for hostage-takers.

But the way things are now, for a white person like me, trying to reason with the cops is acceptable behavior and the worst I can expect is to be handed a ticket anyway.  For a black person, it's a death sentence.  This double-standard has already bled over from merely the minority communities to all economically disadvantaged and downtrodden – no matter their skin color.  Children are literally dying every day in America at the hands of a police force that has become an occupying army, rather than a band of officers of the peace.

Are you comfortable living in a society in which your own kids or your kids’ friends stand a good chance of getting gunned down by a uniformed cop for jaywalking and having no avenue to seek redress? 

For those of us who’re getting off of the sidelines and standing up, most are objecting to the abuse -- not the rule, but the abuse -- of law and figuring out for ourselves how we as citizens can do something about it so that the law can serve the interests of the average person, as it was designed initially to do. I can't imagine anything more quintessentially American. It's not a question of "America: Love it or Leave it", as so many Regressives will default to, it's a question of how to fulfill the Preamble of the Constitution and do what we can to perfect an imperfect Union.

When it comes to peace officers, we allow them a badge and a gun as the privilege that comes with the responsibility of holding to the highest standards of ethical behavior.  Now, we have incident after incident after incident after incident of cops targeting minority communities for non-violent misdemeanor crimes and using excess – often lethal -- force every time.  There are simply too many cases of deliberate excessive lethal force among the cops over too long a period of time for the “few bad apples" argument to carry any weight.  The entire police force – including the “bad apples” that perpetuate violence and the “good apples” that refuse to check their brothers-in-arms – has been exposed as unworthy of their position across the board.  While excessive force is this commonplace and legally sanctioned, I'm afraid anybody who wears the uniform is now officially suspect.  I advise all my readers to avoid contact with the police at all costs.

The whole point of Habeas Corpus and Miranda is that the citizen should be protected from unwarranted search and seizure. The fact that the cops are ignoring this -- in particular with the minority community -- should be enough to make even the most ardent Regressive take notice.  

And to those who inevitably accuse me of “race-baiting”, I can only say that it's not and never was “race-baiting” to point out real systemic racism.  Asserting that it is essentially is a "know your place, N-word" argument that doesn't hold up in the face of facts.  As a white man from an upper-middle-class neighborhood, I grew up with certain privileges as a citizen. It's hardly "race-baiting" to insist that my fellow citizens be guaranteed the same rights and privileges I enjoy when they most clearly aren't getting that guarantee.

While all of us as citizens have a duty to stand up with respect, dignity and civility, the real burden of responsibility remains with those holding the badge.  Since those carrying badges won’t stand up for the legal inborn rights of the citizenry, then it’s time for us – We, the People -- to stand up and do it ourselves.  

Secular Liberalism's True Enemy is Fundamentalism -- No Matter Which Religion

In regards to the whole Bill Maher-Sam Harris-Ben Affleck "feud", I have this to say:

I'll cede that Affleck was rude and inappropriate -- and at very least deserves to be held in detention for a few periods by Emily Post. Speaking for myself, though, I personally disagree with Harris for the simple reason that he and Maher fell into parroting the same old Bush-era rhetoric that, were it not involving Muslims, they'd otherwise condemn as a FOX soundbyte. Yes, Islamophobia does in fact play a part in all this.

There's a bigger enemy to Liberalism in the world than the bogeyman of Saladin, and I think Harris and Maher are missing it.

From what I can see, trying to look at the world as a whole, Religious Fundamentalism is springing up around the world across all cultural lines. Christian fundamentalists here at home are inciting violence nearly as barbaric across the USA and in Europe in many forms, from physical violence to terror threats on individuals to passing of discriminatory local and state laws. Think of all the Christian laws being passed across the USA that attack the Liberal Values that Maher champions in the same ways the Taliban did early on, from forced prayer in public schools to re-writing science books to fit a idiot's literal interpretation of scripture. Think of the Christians who murder doctors or attack women in mobs at abortion clinics for "disobeying God's Law".

I don't condone Muslim fundamentalist beheadings any more than I condone lynchings or shootings in the name of Christ. Personally I consider the two examples to be different flavors of the exact same thing. Theocracy is on the rise in the world. It doesn't matter if it's in the form of some Muslim Bogeyman or Pat Robertson, because in the end, it all boils the same thing -- all of us, free-thinking, reasonable peaceful thoughtful people are being increasingly attacked just for being free-thinking, reasonable, peaceful and thoughtful people who may not fall into line behind the "right" version of "God". That's what's happening in the Muslim world and that's what's really starting to happen in the West.

Bush-era rhetoric leaves no room to think about anything other than the Muslim Bogeyman, and so long as we're focused on the Muslim Bogeyman, the American version of the Taliban will keep winning. I'd have hoped Harris and Maher would've known better than to fall into that particular trap.

That said, here's the article Harris posted in regards to that same show. I leave it to you guys to decide and debate.

Why I Debate Regressives

I recently got into a debate on Facebook regarding the Koch Brothers.  

My opponent was a typical "Free-Marketer" who argued that the Koch Brothers' attempts to create a Corporate Feudal Aristocratic Oligarchy in this country was somehow a good thing -- using the usual "well, they're not the only ones" argument -- and that any protections for the average person by the government -- such as raising the minimum wage -- was somehow detrimental to the general welfare of the nation at large.  Obviously, this became a days-long, protracted nightmare of untangling false equivalencies and teaching remedial civics and economics to someone who clearly should know better.

"But, FUP," you might ask, "Why on earth do you continue to debate these people who either lack the ability to do their research or have a vested interest in promoting Regressive talking points?" 

It's a good question, one that my girlfriend asks me whenever I get into these debates.  I usually end up glued to my screen and in a foul mood until either my opponents shut up or I throw my hands up in disgust.  I'm obviously not going to change anybody's mind or have any real impact on the audience who probably has long since stopped reading the back-and-forth.

But that's not why I do it.

I continue to debate in these online forums for myself.  The practice of these wordy head-butting exercises helps me hone my arguments into something that can't be easily picked apart.  It educates me on things that I might not be otherwise aware of, as I usually am also going through several search engines' worth of research to back up my arguments with verifiable and certified facts.  

When 9/11 happened, I was 20 years old and had a tough choice to make -- to join up and defend my country through force of arms while it was under attack or not to join my friends in enlisting.  Thankfully, I'd had a very good education -- probably the last class of my generation to attend a public school where critical thinking, particularly about politics and history, was drilled thoroughly into us.  I'd already learned how to read between the lines of political talking points and to do my research on what the talking heads on the television were saying.  

I realized, very quickly, that joining up and fighting in a foreign land that had officially no real connection to the tragedy of those days was not going to further my goals as a patriotic citizen.  It was already public knowledge that companies like Halliburton, Exxon and the rest that had strong ties to the new Bush Administration were chomping at the bit to use the American Military as a tool for their own profit.  

Having already read authors like Sun Tzu and Julius Caesar's commentaries on conquest, having already a strong familiarity with American Revolutionary writers such as Thomas Paine and having done my homework on the situation at hand, I decided that, instead of becoming canon-fodder for the profit of interests that were trying to turn my country into a one-party state, I could better serve my country as an informed citizen, on guard at home against the forces that would erode our national systems from within.  To me, that was always the gravest threat of all.

To me, engaging in debates with those who disagree continues to be my form of exercising and defending the Free Speech that is the quintessential American Right.  As a free-born citizen in what still claims to be a democratic republic, I take it as a civic responsibility to debate the issues facing my country with my fellow citizens.  As these debates progress, I become a better informed citizen and learn tactics that might help others in better positions than I am to make a positive difference.

And, if nothing else, these debates end up creating wonderful source material for posts in here.  What could be more definitively American than to continue Ben Franklin's tradition of self-publishing into the 21st Century?